All the Difference in the World
by KimberlyTheOwl
Summary: Sequel to Victim, Bait, Hero, Friend. John explains and Sherlock remembers. "The wounds left in my heart by his mock-suicide and long absence are still surprisingly raw... The emotions... remind me painfully of that day when he returned, the joy and anger, hurt and caring, all mixed together. We're both still healing from that day, even if it began in sorrow and ended in joy."


**Author's Notes:**

**I know I said that I was going to wait on this sequel, but that little resolution only lasted a day before I started working on this. It's true that we don't know what Season Three holds for our boys, but I want to get this out of my head while it's fresh and before I lose interest. So: for timeline, assume that it's after Sherlock's return from 'death', however he manages that, and that enough time has gone by for life to get back for more-or-less normal.**

**I decided to use first-person, present-tense, John's POV for this, because I like the intimacy and immediacy that brings. So the feel will be a little bit different in this one. Also, whatever happens next season, I think that our boys won't be behaving in exactly the same way. I think that their time apart, and all that entails, will change them. So if they don't feel entirely in character, that's mostly intentional.**

**This is a sequel to Victim, Bait, Hero, Friend, and assumes that you've read that first. If you don't, this one won't make a lot of sense.**

**Warnings for discussions of rape and abuse. This may be disturbing to some of you; by the same token, it's meant to be healing as well. I'm trying to speak through the characters to those who might need to hear the same message.**

**Of course, I don't own these characters; I just like to take them out once in a while and play with them and get them crying.**

All the Difference In The World

We're down at the Yard, having come down to help with an unusual case. Some kind of serial rapist, who was targeting women of a particular body type and appearance. All of the victims were short, slightly plump and very curvy, with long dark hair and dark eyes. They all dressed similarly. None of them admitted to knowing each other, and the police hadn't been able to find any common thread other than the women's own appearance. So Lestrade invited us down to look at the files and talk to the most recent victim.

We're just getting settled with coffee and the hanging up of coats when Sherlock announces that he is going to start with going through the files and that he wants _me _to talk to the young woman first.

I draw him aside for a private word in the corner of the outer office.

"Sherlock, do your own interviewing," I tell him in a low voice. "You know you're never happy with the way I do it. You always think I've missed something." I'm frankly baffled. "You went to the trouble to come down here, now you're not even going to talk to her?"

He looks faintly surprised. "John, I am simply trying to put into practice some of those principles of human relations that you are forever harping upon. You're always after me to be less rude and abrasive to the victims and witnesses." He smiles slightly, and the effect, as always, is somewhat disarming. "As a doctor, you have a more gentle manner, while still adequately thorough, and there is that additional matter that you will be able to properly relate to her experience, having been a victim of rape yourself."

As so often happens when someone has said something that they ought not to have said, Sherlock's last few words are uttered during a moment of absolute silence and so carry rather nicely around the room. Even without turning my head, I can see reactions on the faces of both Lestrade and Donovan. Shocked and rather ill for the first, and just plain shocked for the second.

A split second later, I see Sherlock's face turn absolutely white as he realizes what he has said. His time away from his 'normal' life, during the period he was thought to be dead, really has changed him. He doesn't offend people on a regular basis anymore. The sharp edges have softened quite a bit, even if the wit certainly hasn't. He seems more aware of the needs of those few that he considers his friends, less likely to brush them off or ignore them. He apologises, when the need is clear. He says 'please' more often. He laughs more, and he even touches people now… trusted friends like myself, Molly, and Mrs. Hudson for the most part, but that's more than ever before.

So I know, now, that what he just said was a slip of the tongue, rather than the result of any of his old indifference about my feelings. Somehow, a piece of knowledge that he had classified as 'true but top secret' has migrated into the category of 'true and suitable for everyday conversation with Lestrade and others'… without ever having been something that we talked about openly, or that I'd ever acknowledged to Sherlock.

I'm not surprised he's figured it out. He was the one who took care of me after it happened, even though I refused to discuss it. I certainly gave him enough broad hints. I'd asked him to not pry any further, to not try to use his powers of deduction, to not go snooping around asking questions. I know… as well ask the sun to not rise as to ask Sherlock to disable his curiosity, but he seemed to have honoured our agreement. Never, since that horrible night, when he comforted me in the wee hours of the morning while I wept out my shame and terror on his shoulder, has he ever mentioned the episode again.

Greg Lestrade knows the whole story, all of the graphic details from which I protected Sherlock, and I'll always be grateful for the way he put his other duties on hold for those few minutes in order to hear me out. He has also never mentioned any of it again, except for one brief, awkward conversation we had right before Moriarty's trial. He'd come to the flat when he knew Sherlock was out, and asked me very gently if I wanted to step forward and press charges. Add the rape charges to everything else Moriarty was facing, see if that would really put the nail in the coffin, plus give me some degree of closure. I answered him honestly … that the trauma of a public testimony would not be worth anything that the authorities added to Moriarty's sentence.

"I thought that was what you would say, John," he'd said that day, "and I respect it. I just wanted to make sure that if you wanted us to charge him… well, I would do everything in my power to make it stick." His eyes had burned a little when he said it, reminding me that the trauma of that night had reached out to affect those around me. So I'd hugged him and thanked him for his concern, and reassured him that I would be all right even without that very specific revenge.

And then they acquitted Moriarty, and I was both ridden with guilt for not pressing charges and testifying, and glad that I hadn't spoken up against him before he was released again.

I told my personal physician, and my therapist. That was it. And when Moriarty died on the hospital roof, by his own hand… that meant only those three people, plus myself, knew the full extent of what he did to me.

Sherlock stares at me for a few second, his jaw working slightly. Donovan stares at me, and now I read pity in her eyes. She's gotten a lot easier to work with since Anderson transferred away last year; she no longer calls Sherlock 'Freak' and she's actually civil to both of us, especially me. Lestrade looks away, clearly embarrassed. It's up to me to break the silence, and I do so with the first words that come to mind.

"Right, then, I'll go have a talk with her." I square my shoulders, grab the notepad and pen and go into the inner office to talk with my fellow rape victim, ignoring the dropped jaws around me.

The day becomes a long session of interviewing and talking. Sherlock reviews every scrap of evidence and comes up with a few theories that give Lestrade something to go on. It's dark by the time we get out of there and hail a cab. We don't talk on the way home, and the tension is palpable. Sherlock doesn't seem to want to look at me, and when I glance his way, he's starting out the window. His cheek twitches nervously and he's restless.

As we walk upstairs, I decide that a drink is the first order of business for both of us. And not tea, either. I don't know why this is affecting Sherlock as much as it is, but he's clearly not comfortable.

I check the freezer while he sprawls on the sofa. No ice, so it'll have to be brandy. I pour a generous measure into each of our only two intact snifters, walk on stocking feet to the sitting room, and hand one to him.

He frowns at it. "Brandy? Why?"

I sit down in my favourite armchair. "Maybe you don't need it, but I do. It's traditional after one has had a bit of a shock." I take a sip. Not expensive stuff, but decent and reasonably smooth. I feel it burn a path down my oesophagus.

He stares at the glass, doesn't take a drink. "Have I had a shock?"

"Well, no, but I have." I can't keep a certain amount of bitterness out of my voice. "A damned embarrassing one."

He picks up the snifter and drinks. Rather a large gulp; I'm surprised he doesn't choke on it. Sherlock isn't much of a drinker unless there's an experiment involved.

Or unless he's very shaken.

"I'm sorry," he says quietly, not looking at me. "I shouldn't have said what I did. I knew that as soon as the words left my mouth." He toys with his glass. "My mind doesn't usually fail me like that. Secrets… normally they stay where I put them."

I have a sudden mental image of a wooden chest, with dark secrets like small evil black creatures, trying to escape and crawl out into the daylight. Considering all of the mystery that still surrounds this addictive, intriguing man who has become my dearest friend, it must be a rather large chest.

"How… how long have you known?" I resist the urge to shout at him, to remind him of his promise not to snoop. "How did you find out?"

"I've known ever since Moriarty's trial was over. John, he told me himself." He took another large-ish sip, and I notice that his hand is trembling… just like it did that night in the pub in Dartmoor. "He sat here, in this very room, and bragged about what he'd done to you, and why. Had I been armed, I would have killed him at that very moment, and hoped that Mycroft could have gotten me off."

Now I understand his pallor, the surprising depth of his emotion. He hadn't just come to this conclusion over time, by logic. He'd had the truth flung in his face, with some kind of obscene triumph, by the man who became his most hated enemy. And he'd kept his knowledge a secret until today, never telling me and therefore respecting our agreement. No wonder he accepted the brandy.

In his eyes, he'd failed me that night. Not only had I been captured, used against him, put at very real risk of death, but I'd been assaulted in an unspeakable manner. And I'd kept the details bottled up inside of me, even if I'd finally let on that I was hurting and allowed him to help. No wonder he was looking at me, now, with anger and fear and even a bit of self-loathing written plainly on his face.

It's up to me to speak next.

"Sherlock, that was a long time ago. I haven't forgotten it, but it's over. It's not something I think about every day. It's all right."

He continues almost as if he hadn't heard me. "At first, I couldn't think about it, couldn't take it in. There was so much else happening right then, that I… well, I stored it away, to process later."

I speak quietly. "And did you?"

"Yes." He drops his gaze. "While I was gone, I had a lot of time alone. I brought it to the front of my mind, and made myself think about what you had suffered. I needed to understand, John, and I needed to make sure that nothing like that would ever happen again."

This sounds a little extreme, even for Sherlock. "You can't protect anyone from every bad thing that might happen to them, Sherlock. No one can do that."

We sit again in silence for a few moments and sip at our brandy. Finally, I nerve myself up to ask a difficult question.

"So, you know about what Moriarty did to me." I search for the right words, not wanting to sound overly dramatic, or like a bad advice column. "Sherlock, does it make any difference to you? To me living here, in the flat? To our work together?"

He finally looks up again, back at me, and to my surprise I see some unidentifiable old pain in his eyes. "It makes all the difference in the world, John." He gulps slightly. "It means that you can understand why… I am who I am." And then he frowns and looks away. "But… I've never… I can't …"

Silence. I think I might know what he means, but I can't be sure. He hasn't given me quite enough to go on. I have to ask. "Sherlock… did something like that happen to you?"

He stands up and goes to the window, peers out of it. I see him reach for his violin, and I know he's about to pick it up and terminate the conversation by playing something soft and sad. I've learned his tricks, and I don't allow him to do it.

"Sherlock… don't. Please."

He drops his hand, surprisingly obedient.

"Come back over and sit down."

No response. He stares out the window, his back to me, his posture rigid.

"Sherlock." I let a hint of exasperation tinge my voice. "You can't just go around dropping bombshells like that, without explanation." I get up, a bit stiffly, and start to walk toward him. "You don't have to tell me everything, but don't you think it might be a good idea if you explained… what you meant?" What were his words?

_All the difference in the world._

_You can understand why am I who I am._

He tenses as I approach him, and there is something in his posture that brings to mind a wild animal, ready for flight. _Approach with caution, then. _I stop short of what I really want to do, which is to put a hand on his shoulder and force him – gently – to turn around and look at me. Instead, I stop behind him, and try to catch a glimpse of his face reflected in the streaky window glass.

His jaw is working, and his eyes are closed, with tears leaking out from under the lids, and it's clear that he is just a millimetre away from either collapsing completely or brushing past me and stomping out. I can't let the latter happen; the former might actually be good for him.

As I look at him, I'm reminded once again of how he looked in the pub that night in Dartmoor. I'm really not proud of how I handled that. At the time, I was busy being angry with Sherlock, first for his 'I haven't got friends' comment and next for plotting to drug me and lock me in the lab. But later, after the case was solved and we were back home, I realized that some of the fault was mine. I was uncomfortable with the idea of the formidable Sherlock Holmes showing fear and anxiety, and actual _tears_, and I tried to ignore what I was clearly seeing. I sat down in that armchair by the fire and blathered on about what we knew of the case so far and what we ought to do next, while he just became more and more distressed.

It's a doctor thing. People break down and cry in front of the doctor, because it's a safe zone. What we're supposed to do is acknowledge the emotion, acknowledge the grief or sadness or fear, hand over a box of tissues, and then continue gently on as if we hadn't seen the tears. The last part gets too easy with time, and the first two parts can get forgotten. I think I hoped that if I just kept speaking calmly and logically, Sherlock would pull himself together.

But he didn't, and we had those harsh words, and I stormed out that night. How might the outcome have been different if I'd treated him more gently? Acknowledged his fear without worrying about the facts of the case, and simply listened to him rattle on? Asked him how I could help?

"Sherlock… I'm sorry." I clear my throat, and dare to touch his shoulder lightly. "Would you rather I leave you alone?"

An almost imperceptible shake of the head. This is progress. The shoulder under my hand is trembling slightly. He opens his eyes, and now I see wide, dilated pupils that stare unseeing into the dark of the street. I can see the pulse in his neck, fluttering far too quickly.

And it hits me, of course. I'm a military doctor, I've seen many young men and women in the grip of reliving past trauma… hell, I've been there myself. Lay people tend to think of PTSD sufferers as having dramatic flashbacks in which they are literally out of their minds reliving the event, and that certainly can happen, but most sufferers are quieter about it. Intrusive, realistic memories triggered by something that reminds one of one's own trauma, that can bring on crying spells and anxiety attacks… that sort of thing is far more common.

"Do you want to tell me more about this?" I keep my hand on his shoulder and my voice neutral.

He responds with a quick dip of his chin.

"You can come sit back down, or you can stay here." _You're in control, here, mate. You tell me._

He draws his sleeve across his face, wiping his eyes and nose, and sniffs a bit. It's oddly endearing, almost childlike.

"John, I'm sorry," he croaks hoarsely. "I didn't … I don't understand why this is happening. What's happening to me?"

_This is something very deeply buried, then. It's possible he's almost managed to make himself forget about it, if he's forgotten what it feels like to have the fear rise up again. This is Sherlock, after all. He tells his brain to delete unnecessary data. _Aloud, I say only, "It's all right, Sherlock. I think you are remembering something… or some details, anyway, that you'd rather forget." I squeeze his shoulder reassuringly.

He gulps and nods, and then turns fully toward me, and the next thing I know he's got those ridiculous long arms wrapped around me so tightly I can hardly breathe for the surprise of all of it. Oh, Sherlock has hugged me before this. He's been there for me when I needed him, when I was hurt, and when he returned from his 'death' he embraced me as soon as he could get me to stop hitting him... but this is different. I've never seen him this shaken, this much _not_ in control of himself.

He's so tall that he has to crouch a little to get his head onto my shoulder, but he manages it. And my shoulder grows damp with his tears, and my heart throbs painfully and wants to break, as he weeps almost soundlessly in my arms. Every barrier is down, tonight.

There aren't any real words to help someone who is going through this kind of experience, and it's not like he is going to process anything I say right now. I've learned from what happened at the pub in Dartmoor. No attempts at logical analysis, no minimizing of the experience, no more questions. I hold him as tightly as I can and pat his back awkwardly a few times.

He'll talk to me when he's ready.

Finally, he pulls away. I loosen my grasp immediately, not wanting him to feel trapped in the slightest, but then I take his arm and lead him to the sofa. He doesn't resist when I tug him down to sit on one end.

'Here." I don't have a box of tissues handy (after all, we are a couple of sloppy bachelors, and the tissues are probably in the bathroom or God only knows where) but I know that Sherlock usually keeps a handkerchief in his suit jacket. I retrieve the jacket from where he's tossed it over the other arm of the sofa and fish out the handkerchief. He takes it from me wordlessly.

I grab both of our brandy glasses. "I think we are going to need refills, to cope with all of this. Wait here." Alcohol is a depressant, but it also numbs pain and releases inhibitions, and the latter effects will be useful even if the first effect is risky.

Returning with refilled glasses of brandy, I set them down on the glass-topped table, then claim a seat. This time, I sit next to him on the sofa. It's not as good for studying his face, but my instincts tell me that physical closeness is more important right now. Somewhat hesitantly, I slip my arm around his back.

"Better?"

He nods, twisting the handkerchief in his hands, and leans against me. I gulp a little and close my own eyes, pulling him even closer. The wounds left in my heart by his mock-suicide and long absence are still surprisingly raw, and it hasn't taken much to bring those feelings to the surface again. The emotions, the tears, and the way we are treating one another remind me painfully of that day when he returned, the joy and anger, hurt and caring, all mixed together. We're both still healing from that day, even though it began in sorrow and ended in joy.

I clear my throat, take a gulp of brandy, and take a stab at the core issue. "Who was it, Sherlock?"

He is silent for so long that I wonder if he understood me, or if perhaps he has fallen asleep. If he has, I'll tuck him in on the sofa and leave him to rest for the night. But no, he answers.

"Step-father."

With the exception of the formidable Mycroft, I've never met any of Sherlock's relations. Nor heard very much about them. Now, with one word, I know more than I have ever known before.

"Tell me," I coax.

He takes a deep breath, and straightens up. I take my arm away from his back. "Father died when I was eight."

"What was he like?" This seems like a safe way to get started.

His facial muscles twitch into a ghost of a smile. "Brilliant. Moody. Talented… he spoke several languages, played the cello like a professional. Very good-looking." A sidelong glance to me, answering the question I hadn't asked. "It wasn't illness or an auto crash or anything like that. Suicide."

"I'm sorry." It was the only appropriate response. _I wonder if he has any photographs? Sherlock's father sounds so very much like him._

"There was a scandal, and he couldn't cope. He'd been having an affair, and the whole district found out about it very publicly." He sniffs and rubs at his nose with the handkerchief. "Mummy … would have forgiven him, I think, if only to keep up the pretence of a happy marriage. But he couldn't bear it, any of it, and he shot himself. It was hunting season, so it was put about that he'd been cleaning his gun and it had gone off. Saving face, you know." He reaches for his glass, takes another healthy swallow.

A horrible thought occurs to me. "Sherlock… you weren't the one to find him, were you?"

"No." He shudders. "But Mycroft did. Found him, in his study. No note, of course, that would have given away the farce about cleaning the gun. Mycroft… took it very hard."

I close my eyes, thinking of Sherlock's cool, distant, carefully controlled older brother. Sherlock wasn't the only Holmes I was going to learn more about tonight. "And your father's mistress?"

A twisted sort of smile from Sherlock this time. "His lover, you mean. Ten years younger than my father, and also from a good family. I met him once or twice, before the scandal broke, and rather liked him. They shipped him off to a post in Hong Kong."

"Ah." _Good God, this sounds like something from Masterpiece Theatre. Very Evelyn Waugh._ "So… your mother remarried."

He nods and sips again at his brandy. He's getting control back, now. These are old sources of pain, the family tragedies, but not what had him so upset earlier. "Two years later, when I was ten. I … thought he was all right, at first. I wanted Mummy to be happy. She wasn't really the type to just carry on by herself as the tragic widow."

Now I'm curious. "What's your mother like?" I'm also putting off the moment when he has to tell me more about his step-father.

"She's… a difficult woman," he answers slowly. "She was always beautiful. After my father died, the suitors clustered around as soon as it was decent. She lives her life as if she is acting. More concerned about what society thinks of her and her family than anything else."

_A handsome, talented, melancholy (and bisexual, apparently) father. A beautiful but calculating and distant mother. Oh, yes, Sherlock, I can see what has gone into both your genetic makeup and your upbringing._

"So… the step-father," I prompt. "He was all right at first."

"Yes." Now he stares out across the room. "The Colonel didn't take much notice of us boys when he first married Mummy. Oh, we saw him at dinner, and he would ask about our studies. It… was a couple of years later, when I was twelve, that things started to get… uncomfortable."

I don't dare say anything at this point. I take another sip of brandy, instead. I'm afraid to stop the flow of memory, but I also dread hearing it. Instead, I look at Sherlock's profile and try to imagine him at age twelve, with his odd androgynous beauty placed in that setting of youth and innocence. His fine features, smooth fair skin, and icy pale eyes would have made him a striking lad. He probably had that same mop of unruly curls; maybe they would have been a few shades lighter, perhaps sun-bleached at the ends. _Yes, he would have been a beautiful boy. A natural target for a predator._

"He started paying attention to me. Always me, never Mycroft, although Mycroft was at university by then and only home for holidays anyway." He looked down at his lap. "That was part of it. I was lonely with Mycroft gone, and he wasn't there to …" He trails off.

"To advise you?" I suggest quietly. "Protect you?"

He nods. "The Colonel started giving me gifts. Expensive gifts. Things that he knew I really wanted, but that Mummy didn't necessarily approve of. Books that were a bit too adult for a twelve-year-old. A very high-quality chemistry set and microscope. A computer. And always, plenty of cash." He took a deep breath. "It was the cash that started it. Mummy didn't like me having much for pocket-money; she was very old-fashioned about that. So the Colonel used to slip me money when she wasn't looking. It was like a game with us," he says, bitterness evident in his voice.

"And then one night he came to my room instead, to give me a new book. So that Mummy wouldn't know, he said. Because it was an old and valuable book and that she wouldn't approve." He lifts his knees up and tucks his feet onto the sofa in front of him, wrapping his arms around his legs. "I was… already in bed when he came into the room. He…" He trails off and is silent. He raises the brandy glass and takes another large swallow, sputtering a bit.

I touch his shoulder. "Sherlock, it's all right. You don't have to go into the details if you don't want to."

"No… it's not that." He shakes his head. "The truth is, I don't remember very much about that night. I know that he touched me. Inappropriately. And that he… exposed himself to me. But other than that, all I really remember of that night is that he told me I had to keep it a secret, and that from that moment on, I was terrified of him." Now the trembling comes back. "I did everything I could not to be caught alone with him, but it was no good. He was there when I came home from school, even if Mummy was out. When the weather was good, I stayed outside until dinner, did my lessons under a tree as far from the house as possible, but when it rained, there was nowhere to hide. And at night…"

The rising panic in his voice is more than I can stand. My arm goes back around him, and I pull him back against my shoulder. I'm worried, at first, that he won't want to be touched, but he doesn't resist. "So… it happened again?"

"And again, and again." His voice is muffled against his knees. "I kept a journal for a while, and while I was generally vague in my entries, I know that it kept happening over the next few years." Tears in his voice, now. "I wanted to die. I truly wanted to die. Or better yet, I wanted to kill him. But I couldn't come up with a way that would be fool-proof and not traceable back to me."

_Why didn't you tell anyone? _That's what I want to ask. But I know it's the wrong thing to say. Child sexual abuse victims don't tell, for a myriad of reasons. Perhaps he thought no one would believe him. Perhaps he thought someone would be harmed if he told. Perhaps he'd convinced himself it wasn't really happening, that it was all a series of bad dreams.

_Perhaps he thought no one would care._

Instead, I ask, "Have you ever told anyone about this before? Have you kept this locked up inside, all of those years?"

He shakes his head, but speaks with a hoarse voice. "Mycroft knows."

"You told him?"

"No. He's the one who stopped it." He rocks himself to and fro on the sofa, becoming more agitated. "He was home, visiting for a few days. Finished with university, had his first job and his first flat." Now the words come quickly, almost staccato in nature. "Thought I'd pinched one of his books. Gathering up the last of his things, you know, to move them to his place. Came into my room that night, without knocking, just to be a prat."

He shivers. "Caught him in the act, caught the Colonel on top of me, his trousers down… oh, God, John, the look on his face. I'll never forget the look on his face, until the day I die." He sits back up, runs his hands through his wild hair. "He tore that man off of me and threw him on the floor. I honestly thought that Mycroft was going to kill him, but he was brilliant even back then. He kept his head."

"What did he do?" I ask softly. _A compliment for Mycroft? He's definitely upset._

"I… only found out some of it later, when the … arrangements were being made. He…" Sherlock sniffles again. I hand him the handkerchief, which he'd managed to drop in his agitation. "He had me get dressed and sent me to his room to wait for him. Then… he dragged the Colonel all the way down the hall, trousers 'round his ankles, to Mummy's bedroom, and confronted her. There was an almighty row, accusations flying all over the place. In the end, he told Mummy that if she didn't sign over guardianship of me and send me to live with him, he would go to the police."

_Typical Mycroft. Even at such a young age, he must have had a keen sense of his own power, his own leverage. _"So you went to live with him?"

"Yes. It was just a small flat, his first one, so I had to sleep on the sofa. For a couple of years, until he got a bigger place. And then not long after that I went off to university. But I was safe. I never saw the Colonel again." He twisted the handkerchief in his hands. "I loved Mycroft for saving me, but… John, I know this doesn't make any sense… but I hated him for it, too." He gulps. "I hated that he knew. I hated that he'd seen me like that, weak and vulnerable, half-naked and degraded," he spat out. "I hated that I hadn't been able to get out of the situation, somehow, with my own brains."

"Did you ever actually talk about it, Sherlock, you and Mycroft?" _He saved you, your brother, but did he take the time to make sure you were all right? Did he comfort you? Tell you it wasn't your fault?_

"Talk, no. Not really. That night… when he came back to his own room, where I was waiting, I was too much in shock to talk. Very upset."

"I can imagine," I say dryly.

"He helped me pack a bag, and we left the house immediately for his flat. He rubs the now-much-abused handkerchief across his eyes. "I … think he tried to get me to talk about it, but it was too much for him. Too much for me. We both just… shut down. In the morning, he left me just long enough to make the legal arrangements to become my guardian."

"So… you never really talked about it."

He shakes his head.

"What happened with your family?"

He snorts. "Oh, there was a reconciliation, of sorts. Mummy divorced the Colonel, eventually. Not because of me, but his drinking. He was already quite the sot when he married her but it became worse and worse, and finally became more of an embarrassment to her than being divorced." He raises one eyebrow. "From what Mycroft tells me, he's now in a long-term care facility. Dementia from alcohol abuse, destroyed his brain."

"And your mother? Do you see her?"

"That… that is one of the points upon which Mycroft and I disagree." He is starting to sound more like himself. "He has been back on good terms with her since the divorce. He seems to think that she knew nothing about what was happening, or that if she did, he had her so dominated that she couldn't do anything about it. I don't agree. I think she knew, and chose her marriage over me." His voice is very bitter. "So every once in a while Mycroft badgers me to go visit, or worse, he kidnaps me and takes me 'home'. I behave badly and insult Mummy, and then Mycroft doesn't speak to me for a while. It's complicated."

I gape at him for a few seconds, astonished by the complex _mess_ of the Holmes family. _My God, how did he turn out as normal as he did?_ I'm dismayed by the depth of the apparent emotional damage, the extent of the broken ties, the lack of normal familial relationships.

The handsome, troubled father, long dead by his own hand. The proud and selfish mother, caring more for appearances than for her sons. The older brother, crafty beyond his years, dispensing his own brand of justice and coming up with his own solutions, yet scrupulously avoiding any negative publicity for his family.

_The damaged younger brother, unable to form normal friendships or fall in love, losing faith in his fellow humans, trusting only to the power of his own intellect. Turning to addictions to nicotine, illegal drugs to dull the pain, quiet the inner voices. Drifting through university without friends…_

It's too much. I want to weep for that boy who still lives in Sherlock's head. I want to find the Colonel, demented or not, and put a gun to his head. I thought I had been damaged, traumatised by my experience with Moriarty. But there's no comparison.

I was assaulted, to be sure. It was frightening, humiliating, painful, emotionally scarring. I wasn't sure I was going to be allowed to survive afterward. But I'm an adult, a doctor, a trained soldier and now a sort of semi-amateur investigator, no stranger to the ugly aspects of life. I've been wounded in body and heart before, and yet become whole again in time. The man who raped me (I force myself to say the word, in my head) is dead, by his own hand. I have friends who comforted me and heard my story. And no one ever had to tell me it wasn't my fault, because I'd been bloody _abducted _and bloody_ tied down _and so the fact was pretty damn obvious.

Sherlock… was just a boy at the time, and despite all of the scientific knowledge that must have been packed into his brain even then, probably astonishingly innocent. He wouldn't have had any idea what was happening, or why. The experience … several _years_ of being quietly molested in his own bedroom, by someone who should have been a trusted family member, must have been bewildering beyond belief. And then rescue and salvation, by the one family member who truly cared for him, but with a cost: no cathartic discussions or even good old family fights, but silence and the keeping up of appearances. My stomach churns with it all.

_I've healed. He hasn't._

_What does he need, in order to heal?_

I've no answers to that, my own question. I come up from my reverie. Sherlock hasn't moved, still leaning against my shoulder. He's stopped trembling and his breathing has slowed. I'm almost sure he's asleep, when he speaks again.

"John… what could I have done to keep it from happening? Please tell me. You understand people, human nature. I don't. I didn't understand when I was just a boy, and I don't now. Was that why it happened? Something in me…" his voice breaks. "Something I was doing wrong, some signal I was sending…"

"Christ, no!" I answer him hoarsely. "There was nothing, _nothing_, you did to encourage him. There was nothing you could have done." I can't stand it anymore. I pull him into my chest, wrap my other arm around him and hug him tightly. "Nothing, with your family the way it was. If your mother had been a different person, then you might have told her. But it wasn't your fault. _It wasn't your fault._" His arms come around me in turn, and he clutches at me like a drowning man. "It wasn't your fault," I whisper into his hair. "Sherlock, you've got to hear that, take it in, believe it. It wasn't your fault. Do you understand? Can you say it?"

We break apart. His face is tear-stained, utterly sad and broken. "It wasn't my fault," he whispers.

"Say it to yourself. Say it every day, until you believe it. Say it out loud to me, if that helps." I put a hand on his shoulder. "You should have had therapy, professional counselling, all those years ago. Your brother should have taken care of that, not just swept everything under the rug. I don't suppose you'd agree to talk to one, now?"

He shakes his head. "No. Why? I've got you, John. You're the only one I trust with this."

My throat tightens at this simple statement. "And I'm your friend, and I care about you, and I'm happy to listen… but remember what I said, that time, about professional distance? I don't really have that. I'm a professional, but I'm too close to you to be really effective."

One more awkward thought comes to my mind, one more thing he might be beating himself up over. "Sherlock… oh, damn, there's no easy way to say this." I search for the right words. "But you need to know… Sometimes, victims of childhood sexual abuse report that even though they hated what was happening to them, their bodies would respond to the stimulation. I don't know if that was the case for you, but if was, it's nothing to be ashamed of. Bodies don't always do what our brains tell them." He'll understand that part, at least. What was it he had said, that night in Dartmoor? _Look, my body, it's betraying me._

He looks away, clearly uncomfortable. "When Moriarty bragged about raping you… he tried, of course, to feed me some line that you had enjoyed it. I knew that was absolute rot, that he was just saying it to hurt me, to goad me to anger… but it made it that much harder to get the picture out of my head."

"Moriarty was a master at playing games," I remind him. "He wanted to play us off against each other. But that never really worked, did it?" I reach up to touch his face. "You're here, you're alive. We're both here and alive. He failed."

"He failed," he echoes me. He reaches up, locks his wrist around my hand. "John… thank you. For everything."

Tears sting my eyes. "You're bloody welcome. Turnabout is fair play."

_What does he need, in order to heal? Maybe just that. Someone to listen and care._

I disentangle myself from him, somewhat reluctantly, and reach for my brandy snifter. I toss off the last of it. Sherlock does the same. I smile at the sight. _That was a lot of brandy, for him. He's going to have a bit of a head in the morning._

We both stand, Sherlock a bit unsteadily. "Time for some sleep, I think. Can you navigate?" I ask. With his tear-stained face and rumpled clothing, he looks terribly young and vulnerable.

He nods. "John, would you…" he starts to say, and then stops. It sounds like a question, but he doesn't go on.

I think I know what he is thinking. "Would you rather not be alone?"

He ducks his head, clearly embarrassed. "No," he whispers. "Will you stay with me?" He doesn't add anything about the way he sat at my bedside that night after we came home from the pool confrontation, but I know he's thinking about it.

I nod. "Of course. Go get ready for bed. I'll come by in a little while."

I putter around the sitting room, picking up the glasses and generally straightening up until I hear his bedroom door open and close. Then I head upstairs to my own room long enough to find halfway-decent pyjamas and robe and get changed. I hit the bathroom on the way back, noting in the mirror that I Look Like Hell. Then I knock on his door.

He's in bed already. I grab the chair and pull it close to the bed and sit. I reach for his hand. He clasps mine.

"John." He murmurs my name. "John… I've figured it out. You're my brother."

I can't help but smiling. He's more than a little drunk, the total lightweight. "Am I?"

"Yes, of course." Now he smiles, and it transforms his face. "Not the one I was born with, that annoying git. The one I've chosen." He squeezes my hand. "The one I was meant to have. The one who makes it stop hurting."

_I will not start crying, I will not start crying…_

With his free hand, he turns the blankets back on the side of the bed nearest me. "Don't sit in a chair all night, John. You'll be sore. It's a big bed. Please, stay with me."

I only hesitate for a moment. There's a symbolism here, one that runs deep. If this is what he needs, a brother not of blood but of choice, who will stay with him and guard his sleep this one night, then who am I to refuse? I shed my robe and slide into the bed, and turn off the bedside light, and reach out my hand once again.

_All the difference in the world…_


End file.
